


bear me my brother under your wing

by Edonohana



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Blood Loss, Brotherly Bonding, Drug Use, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Ghost Character Cannot Be Seen By Live Friend(s)/Loved One(s), Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-19
Updated: 2019-05-19
Packaged: 2020-03-02 07:43:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18806752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edonohana/pseuds/Edonohana
Summary: When Klaus is badly hurt in a drug deal gone wrong, Ben has to get him safely home. That's tough when you're intangible.





	bear me my brother under your wing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [EssayOfThoughts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EssayOfThoughts/gifts).



Ben reluctantly followed Klaus into the alley. It was exceptionally sleazy and sinister-looking, even for a dark alley where you planned to meet with a drug dealer. 

Ever since he’d died, Ben had been in way too many of those alleys. Every time, he’d tried to convince Klaus not to go, and every time, he’d failed. (Unless you counted the times when Klaus had missed the drug buy because he’d overslept, which Ben did not.) Still, Ben wasn’t going to give up. He couldn’t physically knock the drugs out of his brother’s hands, but at least he could make scoring them a little more annoying.

“It’s never a good sign when your drug dealer doesn’t even tell you what sort of drugs he’s selling,” Ben pointed out. 

“He did say,” Klaus replied. “Pills.”

“That’s like saying, ‘Come to dinner at my place. I’m making food.’ For all you know, it’s aspirin marked up one thousand percent.”

Klaus gave an airy shrug. “Maybe aspirin gets you high if you grind it up and snort it, and it’s about to be banned. If I wait till tomorrow to buy it, the markup will be be ten _thousand_ percent. So I think I’m being quite prudent.”

“Don’t you ever want to do something else for a change? Anything else!”

“Such as…?”

“Go to a library,” Ben suggested. “I’ll read over your shoulder.” 

“If you want libraries, go haunt some grad student. Oh, wait, they’re all in dark alleys too, scoring Adderal. Never mind.”

Ben wandered a couple steps away, ending the conversation, and leaned against the alley wall. He supposed one benefit of being a ghost was that he didn’t have to worry about his clothes or skin actually coming into contact with the alley. It looked like anything that did would need to be decontaminated.

He didn’t move when the drug dealer arrived. Ben had spent way too much time already watching Klaus buy drugs and take drugs. There had been a time when he’d thought there was a purpose for his afterlife as a ghost whom only Klaus could see, and it was to get Klaus on a better path. He’d figured once he’d done that, he could go… wherever ghosts went, once their work was done. Ben had spent more time than he liked to remember tying himself up in knots over whether he was really willing to give up even the frustrating half-life of a ghost and move on to nothingness or a total unknown, if it meant helping his brother.

The joke had sure been on him. Klaus was never going to change. And Ben no longer believed in any purpose beyond what he gave himself. He still argued with Klaus, but only because he couldn’t help himself. But he didn’t have to torture himself by watching every single sordid moment of every single sordid drug—

“HEY!”

The drug dealer’s sudden bellow jolted Ben’s attention back to the deal. The man was a big bruiser, not the sort you’d want to snatch a handful of pills from and gulp them down dry before he could stop you. Unfortunately, Klaus had just done exactly that.

Ben hurried over to his brother’s side. “What the hell are you doing?”

Klaus licked his lips and inhaled deeply. “Mmmm. I detect a faint odor of aspirin, a touch of baking powder, and a delicate overtone of rat poison.”

“What?!” To Ben’s annoyance, he and the drug dealer exclaimed simultaneously, like they were on the same page. “Tell me you were kidding about the rat poison.” 

“They’re not fucking rat poison!” The dealer yelled. “Now fucking pay me!”

Klaus laughed in his face, then turned his pockets inside out. The contents consisted of a tube of mascara, a blue thing that Ben really hoped was a toy Dalek because the only other alternative was a butt-plug, a quarter of a chocolate bar (still wrapped; wrapping bitten through), and a silver disc that Ben initially took for a coin, then realized was actually the token commemorating 24 hours of sobriety that Klaus had been handed at the end of his last stint in rehab.

“Run,” suggested Ben.

Instead, Klaus bent down, picked up the chocolate bar, and offered it to the drug dealer. “Care for a nibble? I’ve barely touched it.”

The dealer punched him hard in the gut. Klaus doubled over with a grunt of pain, clutching his stomach, as the dealer turned and walked away.

“Serves you right,” Ben said. “God, Klaus, what did you _think_ was going to happen? Oh, but you got your drugs, so I guess it was all worthwhile.”

Klaus lifted his head. His face was white, but he managed a trembling smile. “They weren’t _that_ good.”

He crumpled to the ground, his hands falling away from his belly. That was when Ben saw the wet red stain spreading across his shirt. Klaus hadn’t been punched, he’d been stabbed.

“Shit,” Ben muttered, dropping to his knees beside his brother. “Shit, shit, shit! Klaus, can you hear me?”

Klaus blinked up at him. He’d put on way too much mascara that morning, his hands shaking from the beginning of withdrawal; his eyelashes were stuck together in clumps, and there were little black streaks and smears all around his eyes. “Think I’ll get to haunt you for a change now?”

If he could have, Ben would have slapped him. Instead, his teeth clenched so hard that he had to consciously pry his jaws apart to speak. “You’re not going to haunt anyone, because you’re not going to die!”

“I have a stab wound that says different.” He giggled suddenly. “Funny. It doesn’t hurt.”

Ben had no idea if the drugs he’d swallowed were taking effect, or if this was shock and blood loss talking, or if it was just Klaus being Klaus. Whatever. He wasn’t going to just sit there and wait while his brother bled to death. 

“Get up, Klaus,” Ben demanded. “You’re going to die if you stay where you are.”

Klaus shook his head slowly, smiling. “It’s quite comfortable here.”

Ben searched for something, anything to say that would motivate him to get up.

“If you die, you’ll never do drugs again. Imagine haunting some other junkie, watching them snort and swallow and shoot up without ever being able to touch the stuff yourself. Imagine seeing a line of cocaine, all tempting and white and… and powdery…”

Klaus gave an exasperated sigh. “If I get up, will Mr. Just Say Boo stop pretending he has any idea what it’s like to want to get high?”

“If you get up and walk,” Ben said. “I’ll talk about whatever you want me to.”

“Or not talk?”

“I’ll shut up as long as you keep walking,” Ben promised. Then, realizing the loophole, added, “In the direction I’m going too.”

“Fine.” With a put-upon sigh, Klaus sat up. But it took him three tries to stand up, and he only made it by clinging to a nearby dumpster. “This is too hard. The ground was cozy…”

“Follow me!” Ben headed out of the alley, hoping if he got Klaus started walking, he’d be able to keep going on automatic pilot. He’d once seen Klaus make a sandwich while he was more-or-less passed out. Of course, the filling had consisted of cigarette butts, so maybe that wasn’t such a great precedent.

He glanced back, and was relieved to see Klaus following him. He was staggering and leaning against the alley wall, dumpsters, trash cans, discarded sofas, and whatever else came to hand, but he was walking. Ben dropped back to walk by his side. It felt as if he could reach out, put an arm around his brother’s side, and give him something better to lean on than a headless mannequin. But he couldn’t, of course. That was the trouble with being dead.

Klaus abruptly stopped, swaying. “I’m so tired…”

“Come on,” Ben coaxed him. “Just a few more steps.”

Klaus stumbled onward, hunched over, forearms locked across his belly. Ben hoped Klaus wouldn’t notice exactly where he was being led to, or that they’d find a working phone booth before they got there. But the sort of alleys where you meet with murderous drug dealer don’t tend to be in the sorts of areas with working phones. The only one in sight had been hacked open to get at the coins.

When Klaus slowed, Ben repeated, “Just a few more steps.”

“It is not,” said Klaus. “You’re just trying to encourage me.”

“You want me to encourage you some other way?” Ben proposed. “Twenty questions?”

“Ugh, no.”

“Childhood reminisces?”

“Like the time dear old Dad locked you in the woodshed without food and water, and said the only way you could get out was to use your power to break out?”

That was about the last thing Ben wanted to remember, but childhood trauma talk appeared to be good for Klaus, at least in the way that was most important right now: angry and wound-up, he was walking faster and more steadily. 

Klaus went on, “Or the time he locked me in the crypt with a bunch of angry ghosts? Or maybe the time he chained up Luther to see if he was strong enough to break free? The time he locked Allison in a closet for trying to rumor him into letting Vanya have a birthday? The time he locked Diego in a vault until he could recite Mark Antony’s speech without stuttering? The time he locked Five into a sensory deprivation tank to teach him to teleport blind? Huh? Like that?”

When Klaus’s flow of words came to a sudden stop, Ben spoke quickly to ensure that his feet didn’t halt with them. “Like what Allison did, yeah. It was brave of her. Or Vanya, leaving sandwiches for Five. You ever do anything like that?”

“I left a bunch of slugs in your bed.”

“I meant nice stuff. Not you being a little asshole.”

But it was being an asshole that put some enthusiasm into Klaus’s words and gait. “I convinced Luther to put on one of Mom’s dresses and wear lipstick by telling him Dad had wanted him to be a girl. I got drunk and threw up on Diego’s bed. I told Vanya her violin sounded like cats singing opera. Hmm. That one might have backfired. I think she took it as a compliment. I got drunk and threw up in Allison’s—”

They turned a corner. And then they were there, in front of the boxing gym where Diego lived. 

“We made it!” Ben exclaimed. “ _You_ made it! Now all you have to do is—” 

As Ben spoke the word “knock,” Klaus, without any of his usual dramatics, quietly folded up and sank to the ground. 

“Hey! Klaus! HEY!” 

Klaus didn’t move. The way he was lying, it was hard to tell if he was even breathing. In frustration and fear, Ben even tried to shake him. His fingers went through Klaus’s shoulder, and Ben yanked them back.

Ben couldn’t imagine how he could alert Diego, but he couldn’t think of anything better to try. So he ran inside, the walls he passed through making his vision flicker, through the empty gym and into Diego’s room. His brother was awake, pacing and tossing knives over his shoulder. They thudded into a target in what Ben briefly thought were a series of inexplicable misses, until he realized that Diego was actually making the outline of... a throwing knife.

All in all, he’d spied on stranger things.

“Hey!” Ben shouted. 

Of course, Diego didn’t notice, but went on to create something being stabbed by the knife. It was too soon for Ben to see if it was a mugger or a monster.

Ben stepped in front of the knives. They went through him, like everything else did. He didn’t feel a thing. Klaus was going to die on Diego’s doorstep, and Diego would find him in the morning, and there was nothing Ben could do about it, because that was the thing about being dead. You watched everything, and could change nothing.

“Klaus is outside,” Ben said, knowing it was pointless. “He’s hurt. He needs you.”

Diego walked to the target and retrieved his knives. He crouched behind a sofa and started throwing them. They curved around the obstacle in graceful arcs and thudded into the target, writing his name in looping cursive. Ben had always enjoyed watching Diego use his power. It was so controlled and elegant, unlike his own. That was the one good thing about being dead, he never had to summon those vicious tentacles again. It wasn’t as if they could do anything now.

Or could they? He’d never tried.

Ben clenched his fists, gritted his teeth, and heard a startled scream burst from his own lips at the shocking pain of his chest ripping open. It was the first pain he’d felt since he died. The tentacles whipped out, eager, hungry. 

And they went through the walls and floor and ceiling, as insubstantial as the rest of him. Diego went on throwing knives, unmindful of the six glowing blue tentacles thrashing about the room, even when one tried to grab him around the waist and tied itself into a knot instead. Ben sagged, defeated. 

A tentacle lashed out and intersected with a knife just as it left Diego’s hand. The knife’s path altered, just the slightest bit. Instead of slamming into the target with a thud, it hit the metal frame, bounced, and fell to the ground. 

Diego was on his feet in an instant, wary and alert. He looked around suspiciously, then stalked through the waving tentacles and toward the door, knife at the ready.

Ben pulled the tentacles back inside his body. As always, they didn’t want to go; as always, it was a relief having them once again contained. But it was much more of a relief when he saw Diego cautiously open the door and see Klaus sprawled on the ground. Diego immediately rushed to Klaus’s side, tried and failed to rouse him, ran to a nearby telephone booth and called an ambulance, and then returned to Klaus. 

This time his efforts succeeded. Klaus opened his eyes and looked only mildly surprised to see Diego. “What’re you doing here?”

“I should be asking that.” Diego tore open Klaus’s shirt. “Is that a stab wound? Who the hell did you piss off this time?”

“Your bedside manner could use a little polish,” Klaus said. 

Diego was too busy unbuckling his harness and taking off his shirt to reply. 

Klaus watched, wide-eyed. “Needs a bit more bump-and-grind, but not bad for an amateur.”

Diego tore a strip off his shirt. “I should use this for a gag.” Instead, he tore off another strip, then folded one into a pad and used the other to secure it. 

“How _did_ you know I was here?” Klaus asked, wincing, and then his gaze traveled up to Ben, who was standing in front of him. “Oh. Ben fetched you.”

“Yeah, okay,” Diego said, which was undoubtedly what he’d have said if Klaus had told him he’d be magically healed if Diego brought him three blue mice, Luther’s left shoe, and a kilo of heroin. 

He checked the bandages, then lifted Klaus gently so he lay with his head in Diego's lap. Klaus was shivering, so Diego draped the remains of his shirt over him, then put his arms around him. Klaus gave a fluttering sigh of relief at Diego's touch.

“Thanks, Diego,” Ben said. “You’re a good brother.”

Ben didn’t expect Klaus to pass it on. But Klaus said, “Ben says thanks. He says you’re a good brother.”

Diego looked startled, then suspicious. Then thoughtful. Ben figured he was trying to decide whether to make a sarcastic comeback or let it slide given Klaus’ condition. But instead, he said, “Where is he?”

Klaus started to speak, but had apparently run out of breath. He flapped his hand, more-or-less in Ben’s direction. To Ben’s astonishment, Diego looked over as if he was going to talk directly to him. No one but Klaus had done that in years. Diego’s gaze was a little to the left of him, but at the right height to look him in the eyes. He’d remembered exactly how tall Ben was.

Ben took a step to the side, so their eyes seemed to meet. He knew Diego couldn’t see him, but it sure felt like he could. 

“You’re a good brother too, Ben,” Diego said. “Thanks for bringing me this asshole. I’ll make sure he gets taken care of. Up to him what he does once they let him out of the hospital, of course.”

“I know,” Ben said with a sigh. “Thanks, Diego.”

Quietly, Diego said, “I miss you.”

“I miss you, too,” Ben said. 

The silence was broken by the sound of approaching ambulance sirens. Diego bent over Klaus. “Hear that? You’re going to be okay. Ben and I didn’t go to all this trouble for nothing. You wanna die, you gotta do it on your own time.”

Klaus was breathing too hard to manage a comeback, but he did roll his eyes. Ben went over and sat down beside them. Carefully, making sure he wouldn't just go through, he laid his palm over Klaus's hand. Klaus looked down and gave the same sigh of relief he'd let out when Diego had held him, with all his solidity and warmth. 

Together, the brothers waited for help to come.


End file.
